Tripoli, Libya: December, 10, 2013: As part of the capacity-building programmes to support the government, civil society and the media, the UN elections team in Libya comprising of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) in cooperation with UNESCO is continuing the support of pre-election preparation activities in Libya. “Promoting quality elections media coverage” training organized by UNDP, UNSMIL and UNESCO is one of the programmes launched jointly in cooperation with the High National Elections Commission of Libya on November 27, 2013.

During this third phase of the training started on December 10, 2013 will continue for four days. The objective of the training is to provide reporting skills to journalist, freelancers and PR officers on how to cover events during elections. Three workshops have been organized before targeting some 80 journalists from all over Libya. Moreover, a one-day seminar on how to work with media during elections were also conducted for staff of 50 civil society organizations. The training has provided basic skills to media professionals aiming at improving free flow of information to the public and is expected to facilitate broad public debate ahead of national and local upcoming elections.

In the formal opening of the training, UNDP Country Director Mr. Eric Overvest, welcomed the trainees and underlined that the importance of the training is to encourage journalists to cover the forthcoming elections objectively. A team of three experts with significant experience in media and media coverage on elections are facilitating the exercise. The training covers conflict-sensitive electoral coverage, gender and minority issues in election reporting.

The UNDP in Libya supports the election process by providing technical assistance to local authorities on the road map to elect the structures of government during the transitional period. The transitional period covers the time intervals from the elections to General National Congress (GNC) and the referendum on a constitution up to the upcoming general elections. The first election that Libya has ever seen is the GNC election organized in 2012 and this was considered a breakthrough for Libya democratic transition process.

This training programme was conducted with the financial support of the Finnish Development Cooperation and Government of Japan.